Below is my column in The Hill newspaper on the surprising invocation of spousal privilege by Nellie Our to refuse to answer questions about her communications with her husband, Justice Department official Bruce Ohr. While the privilege remains an important protection, this invocation raises serious questions about its use where a husband and wife mix marital and professional relationships.

Here is the column:

Congress faced another hurdle this week in its effort to establish the record of how, why and when the FBI was given information from Fusion GPS on its controversial investigation of President Trump.

Just last week, Fusion GPS co-founder Glenn Simpson refused to answer any additional questions by invoking his Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination. Now, former Fusion employee Nellie Ohr, the wife of Justice Department official Bruce Ohr, has invoked spousal privilege to refuse to answer questions from the committee. The use of spousal privilege in this context, however, could prove more damaging for Congress than the underlying allegations involving Ohr. Congress needs to seriously examine of the basis and scope of this common-law privilege in the context of an oversight investigation.

Despite exaggerated claims on both sides, Congress has a legitimate interest in establishing the underlying facts concerning the work of Fusion GPS and the novel involvement of the Ohrs. The fact that a secret investigation was launched under the Obama administration targeting associates of a political opponent should concern all citizens. We now know the Clinton campaign funneled a huge amount of money through its campaign counsel to fund the report by former British spy Christopher Steele. Fusion GPS and Steele also actively tried to place negative media stories about Donald Trump during the presidential campaign.

The issue is not the overplayed theories of Russian “kompromat” schemes on the left or the overheated conspiracy theories on the right. It is the ongoing concern over the alleged use of the FBI, wittingly or unwittingly, to further political opposition research funded by the Clinton campaign. That is a matter worthy of investigation by oversight committees.

That brings us to Mr. and Mrs. Ohrs. In fairness, Bruce Ohr had a prior relationship with Steele as part of his former FBI duties recruiting high-level Russians and oligarchs. Moreover, it is not clear that Nellie Ohr did significant work on the Steele dossier. However, they remain legitimate witnesses with clearly material information needed by Congress. Among the topics is the fact that the Ohrs met with Steele the day before the FBI opened its investigation into the Trump campaign.

Nellie Ohr’s use of spousal privilege raises questions that go beyond this particular controversy. Early spousal privilege assertions were recognized in England in the early 1600s, based on a belief that such testimony was conceptually impossible since a husband and wife were viewed as one. In the 1800s, this common law “rule of incompetency” was denounced by figures like Jeremy Bentham. Some feminists questioned the rule as sexist.

To put it simply, Nellie Ohr has a recognized separate legal existence in her work with Fusion GPS. To put it simply, this was not what the privilege was originally designed to protect. She is not a wife being asked about stray comments from her husband over dinner. She is an accomplished professional with a stellar record. She holds a degree in history and Russian literature from Harvard, and received a history doctorate degree from Stanford University. She previously taught at Vassar College before joining Fusion GPS. She also is a member of the Women in International Security, which is “dedicated to advancing the leadership and professional development of women in the field of international peace and security.”

It was, therefore, not a surprise for Fusion GPS to be interested in her, entirely separate from her connection to Bruce Ohr. That contradicts suggestions that her hiring was a grand conspiracy. However, it also makes her invocation of the spousal privilege more problematic. Nellie Ohr accepted a position with a political opposition research firm working for Hillary Clintonin one of the most bitterly contested presidential elections in history. She actively sought the involvement of her husband on behalf of Fusion GPS. Yet, when asked about those communications and meetings, Nellie Ohr suddenly became “one” with her husband.

In 1952, the Senate counterpart to the House Committee on Un-American Activities accepted a spousal privilege claim because the questions delved into conversations that occurred in a more conventional marital context of using a spouse to incriminate the other spouse by exposing private conversations.

Nellie Ohr’s invocation raises serious questions over how this privilege should apply with many couples working in the same fields.The privilege is a valuable protection to keep spouses from being used as pawns by politicians or threatened as leverage by prosecutors.

Yet, even under conventional analysis, she may have over-extended the use of the privilege. The testimonial spousal privilege is not recognized in many states but, even when recognized, it can allow one spouse to testify against another. The “marital communications privilege” is more broadly applied but only covers confidential communications in a marriage. It is based on the societal importance of protecting the sanctity of a marriage.

Congress, however, is not interested in confidential marital conversations between Nellie and Bruce Ohr. The implications of Ohr’s invocation are hard to overstate. Women have struggled mightily to establish careers separate from their husbands. This invocation undermines that progress. On one hand, some might question the hiring of a woman in light of the complications of her legal “incompetency.” On the other hand, Nellie Ohr’s invocation could be seen as an opportunity for some employers to potentially shield evidence from disclosure by hiring spouses of powerful members of Congress or other government officials. Nepotism and favoritism already are epidemic in Washington. This adds another nefarious advantage to hiring well-connected employees.

Washington is a small town filled with power couples. Under Ohr’s approach, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell(R-Ky.) and his wife, Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao, could refuse to answer questions on a corruption scandal due to their speaking more as spouses than officials.

Ohr may have been asked questions that inappropriately delved into marital confidences; such questions can threaten the “harmony” of marriages long protected under the rule. If, however, Ohr used the privilege to refuse to answer an array of questions, as was reported, then Congress may want to challenge the assertion or, at the very least, consider how to approach such questions in the future.

Nellie and Bruce Ohr chose to mix their marital and professional worlds. The use of the privilege outside of marital conversations would be opportunistic, obstructionist and increasingly irresistible, if allowed. None of this means that the allegations involving Nellie Ohr are true — but she needs to answer those questions in her professional, not her marital, capacity.

Late4Yoga still wearing tin foil hat and clinging to Trump-Russia conspiracy theory for dear life. The more lefty loons cling to this fantasy, the less they develop any real policy game to compete with Trump’s successes.

The 60-days before an election rule expires when the polls close in Hawaii on Tuesday November 6th. IIRC, that’s six hours after EST. So roughly 3:00 am EST on Wednesday November 7th. Mark it on your calendar, Beak Guitar. Shortly after Sunrise on that day it may very well be the Stone’s time in the barrel.

BTW, how are Trump and his tutors doing with that open-book take-home test that Mueller sent them? Did you know that all of the questions are about Conspiracy to Defraud the United States? And none of the answers are in Giuliani’s counter report.

Presumably Trump and his lawyers have copies of Mueller’s questions; otherwise, Maggie Haberman and Mike Schmidt of The NYT would not have reported that they were all questions about Conspiracy to Defraud the United States.

I quickly read Haberman and Schmidt’s Sept. 18 article….I didn’t see that H&S reported ” that they were all questions about Conspiracy to Defraud the United States”.
That particular article dealt largely with complications Trump’s legal team may face because of former (Trump) counsel John Dowd’s extensive communications with Mueller, as well as any info Mueller might have obtained from Cohen, Manafort, or others.
I haven’t seen any news on the status of the written questions in nearly 2 weeks.
If Haberman and Schmidt did an article after the 9-18-2018 article I referenced, I haven’t read it.
In any case, I haven’t seen any reporters present actual, specific knowledge of the questions themselves.
What I have seen are reports on the back-and-forth negotiations between the Special Counsel and Trump’s teams, and some reasonable quesses as to what the specific questions might be.

When the press says “collusion”, what the law says is Conspiracy to Defraud the United States. Twelve syllables are four times better than three syllables, but they take up more space and more time. They could say or write conspiracy, instead. Only one syllable more than collusion. Or they could say or write ConFraudUS. Exactly three syllables.

Dear Late4Yoga – Beneath your hate for the president, I sense that there is a more productive use of your time. Maybe go for a walk around the block and God will send you a message regarding a higher calling.

All conspiracies are participation in the criminal endeavor of others.
There are no criminal conspiracies to do something that is not a crime.

So what EVERYONE has been dying to know is WHAT IS THAT CRIME ?

US law enforcement does nto investigate PEOPLE, it investigates crimes. That is what distinguishes us from the USSR and other totalitarian regimes.

What we all have suspected from the begining and seems much more certain over time – as opposed to Trump/Russia collusion which seems impossible, is that from Dec, 2015 through the present starting with the Obama administration and aparently directed by Obama the DOJ/FBI/CIA/… have been “colluding” to investigate Trump in the hope of finding a crime. ‘

Many on the left do not even deny this.

Regardless, that is CRIMINAL abuse of power, and corruption.

Back to Trump/Russia unless you beleive that an investigation that has leaked like a seive from the start has managed to uncover the progressive wet dream of damning information and kept it secret, Mueller has nothing of consequence to ask Trump.
I am sure there are questions – it is always possible to write questions. But there is no threat to Trump.

Lefty loons just desperately reaching for its Destroy Trump greatest hits, while audience throws up in collective mouths. Time to get of the stage lefty loon Late4Yoga along with Antifa et all. “Jobs not mobs!”

Divisive? Apparently you don’t know what the word means. Un-American leftists are intentionally trying to destroy the nation and replace it with their dreams that leave dictators and fascists in charge.

Just listen to the video’s of our Democratic leaders 10 years ago and what they say today. A 180 degree turn without concern for the American public.

1. Women have a higher drop out rate in the engineering profession, so the surveyed pool is biased toward younger engineers.

2. Women are atypical in engineering management positions

3. Women in engineering tend not to enter the subdisciplines with higher pay scales (the exceptions being chemical engineering and computer hardware engineering, where their propensity to enter is about average). That would be aerospace, nuclear, mining, petroleum. About 9% of all aerospace engineers are female. In the others, women are sufficiently unusual that they’re difficult to enumerate precisely with survey techniques.

:Dr. Rincon did the analysis which of course adjusts for years of experience, etc.:

Because he has the magic power to be able to adjust for the effects of things we do not know what the effects are ?

In the hard sciences where we can conduct properly controlled experiments it is very difficult to get results that are statistically significant.
And often difficutl to actually control for all independent variables.

In feilds such as this where data is not from controlled experiments, where we are trying to issolate meaning from masses of data without meaninful controls. where there are myriads of independent variables and where human behavior is a factor.

Reaching sufficient statistical significance to draw the conclusions you wish to make and then depending on them sufficiently to make laws is damn near impossible.

But the left has beleived there is such a thing as social engineering that it can be done by governments and that it will not blow up in their faces.

And all the above presumes that I actually beleive these results were not influenced by the bias of the researchers.

There is a Romer paper recently on the mathematical problems with complex models – and the regressions necescary to make the adjustments you refer to are all essentially coeficients in a model, regardless Romer concluded that in any area whether there are sufficient variables it is trivial to push the coeficients to get whatever results you want, and that the required adjustments necescary are so small that you need not attempt to adjust them consciously.

Dr. Rincon did the analysis which of course adjusts for years of experience, etc.

No, she provided a summary with some descriptive statistics which she contends came from the Census Bureau which purported to look at pay scales in subdisciplines of engineering. There were no other controls. Her dissertation was completed two years ago at the College of Education of the University of Texas at Austin. A pdf is available via their library. It just has descriptive statistics, not analyses. Statistical analysis is not something she does in her professional publications.

Rincon herself earned a degree in engineering and then quit practicing after less than four years in the field.

In recent weeks, a grand jury in Washington has listened to more than a dozen hours of testimony and FBI technicians have pored over gigabytes of electronic messages as part of the special counsel’s quest to solve one burning mystery: Did longtime Trump adviser Roger Stone — or any other associate of the president — have advance knowledge of WikiLeaks’ plans to release hacked Democratic emails in 2016?

While outwardly quiet for the last month, Robert S. Mueller III’s investigators have been aggressively pursuing leads behind the scenes about whether Stone was in communication with the online group, whose disclosures of emails believed to have been hacked by Russian operatives disrupted the 2016 presidential campaign, according to people familiar with the special counsel probe.

Stone, who boasted during the race that he was in touch with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, has said since that his past comments were exaggerated or misunderstood. Both he and WikiLeaks have adamantly denied they were in contact.

However, prosecutors are closely examining both public comments and alleged private assertions that Stone made in 2016 suggesting he had a way to reach Assange, the people said.

Last month, Randy Credico, a onetime Stone friend, told the grand jury that the Trump loyalist confided during the 2016 campaign that he had a secret back channel to WikiLeaks, according to a person familiar with the matter.

In a series of interviews with The Washington Post, Stone said his only connection to the group was through Credico, a liberal comedian who had hosted Assange on his New York radio program in 2016.

Roger Stone’s advance knowledge of the Wikileaks release is not really what Mueller is interested in, because such advance knowledge, in and of itself, is not a crime. What might be a crime is exactly how and from whom Stone acquired that knowledge and exactly what Roger Stone might have done with that advance knowledge after he gained it.

For instance, Stone may have coordinated with Assange on the timing and content of the Wikileaks release as well as referring Guccifer 2.0 (a.k.a. the GRU hackers) to Wikileaks in the first place. Similarly, Roger Stone may have assisted the Russian troll network at targeting its interference campaign on the social media by showing Guccifer 2.0 how to interpret and exploit the operational data the GRU had hacked from the Democratic Congressional Candidate Committee. And that sort of “weaponization” of the hacked information is just one example of a crime with which Mueller might indict Stone. (Stone is also at risk for a slew of “dark-money” shenanigans, as well.) In any case, in order to charge Stone with a crime and make it stick, Mueller has to deprive Stone of his pretense of being a journalist rather than a rat-stupper.

And what has come out is that Stone’s “advanced knowledge” – did not come from wikileaks, much less Assange.
Stone had multiple sources for his remarks – many of which were media sources. Stone was repeating information that was already public but not widely diseminated with his own spin.

You keep saying Stone “may have” done this or that.
Stone may have time traveled to 3BC and “stupped” mother mary.

to be credible a claim must have evidence to support it.

There is so much of what you are spraying that is garbage – it is unlikely that Gucifer 2.0 is the source of the DNC hacks – if the DNC emails were the result of a hack.
It is however near certain the DNC was hacked – atleast twice, but that does NOT mean wikileaks information came from a hack. The wikileaks information most likely came from a leak in the US.

It is also unlikely that Gucifer 2.0 is actually a hacker, he is more likely someone pretending. Nor is the GRU connection nearly as firm as claimed.

There is much much more on all of this. But the left – and a small subset of the USIC, and Mueller and Brennan have chosen to beleive without credible evidence an improbable version because all likely versions do not fit the narative they want.

The real facts – the ones that are the basis for this story make it clear Stone had no direct contact with Wikileaks or Assange, and that nothing Stone said publicly was not floating arround privately from multiple other sources.

The spin the media comes up with is that this is somehow proof of malfeasance ?

Lets accept the best case scenario – for the left. Stone had direct contact with Assange and Assange told him way ahead of time about many things.
Aside from possibly lying to the FBI – something we do not know Stone did, there is still nothing there.

This best case scenario also presums the nonsensical assumption that wikileaks is a russian pawn.

But the best scenario for the left presumes alot of things that have a high probability of being false.

Not only does Donald Trump’s business empire present many conflicts of interest, but many current and former members of Trump’s White House and cabinet have conflicts of interest. They are, in fact, so numerous that Bruce Ohr’s wife seems like a trifling issue to even raise.

You might give the abidingly poor a measure of public order in the streets and in the schools, remove property taxes on slum real estate, replace a miscellany of sectoral subsidies (e.g. SNAP cards) and open-ended cash doles with a cash wage subsidy, and institute rigorous tracking in schools so that each students’ time is optimally used in school. I.e. you’d do things that Cory Booker did not due during his tenure as Mayor of Newark (during which time most indicia of street crime got worse).

Ben Franklin, we gave you “…a republic, if you can keep it.”
______________________________________________________________________________________________

Merriam-Webster

REPUBLIC

1 b (1) “…supreme power resides in a body of citizens entitled to vote and is exercised by elected…representatives…”
_____________________________________________________________________________________________

Repeal the 19th Amendment by unconstitutional proclamation, suspension and executive order a la “Crazy Abe” Lincoln and Barack Obama.

Repeal the abolition of motherhood.

The American birthrate is in a “death spiral” and soon there will be no Americans left in America.

Stop importing the population.

Stop the dilution into extinction of America and the creation of the United States of Invaders and Hyphenates.

“…to ourselves and our posterity.”

Women, generally, are physically capable of giving birth to as many as 26 children.

Allow American women to abide natural pregnancy, child birth and nurturing, sufficient to defend and grow the nation.

Turley claims: “…Congress has a legitimate interest in establishing the underlying facts concerning the work of Fusion GPS and the novel involvement of the Ohrs. The fact that a secret investigation was launched under the Obama administration targeting associates of a political opponent should concern all citizens. We now know the Clinton campaign funneled a huge amount of money through its campaign counsel to fund the report by former British spy Christopher Steele. Fusion GPS and Steele also actively tried to place negative media stories about Donald Trump during the presidential campaign.”

This is just an attempt by Turley to de-politicize and validate the opposition to the Mueller investigation by attacking the work done by Christopher Steele. It won’t work. The Russians hacked into HRC’s emails and planted stories about her.

First of all, Jon, get your facts straight. The Fusion GPS investigation STARTED with a Republican opponent of the rodeo clown. When that opponent did not receive the GOP nomination, they approached the Clinton Campaign with the information they had obtained to continue the investigation, because the investigation was not complete. This is a fact you pro-Trumpsters like to overlook.

Secondly, Steele was given credible information about Russians working to help get the rodeo clown elected. That information was turned over to the FBI, as it should have been.

Third: nothing in the Steele investigation has been proven to be untrue so far.

But, why is this today’s big story, anyway. Why not cover the Khashoggi murder and Trump’s milquetoast response? How about the children still being held in cages? How about the exploding deficit, and McConnell’s plan to cut Medicare, Social Security and Medicaid to pay for tax cuts to the 1%? Those are far more relevant and timely political issues. Oh, wait a minute. I forgot. This is all about diverting attention away from more of Trump’s failures.

Anonymouse:
“But, why is this today’s big story, anyway. Why not cover the Khashoggi murder and Trump’s milquetoast response?”
********************
A virulent anti-Semite journalist is allegedly killed in a foreign country by supposed elements of another foreign government who is helping us in the war on terror and you think we should have the President run around with his hair on fire and gut our efforts to find and kill terrorists who would do us harm. You Dems have a strange set of priorities.

Try this: I’m an American; I think of American interests first. The circumstances of some permanent green card guy who aligns with the Muslim Brotherhood means less to me than the well-being of the country as a whole.

Even Fatso and the crown price admit that Khashoggi was killed. Second, the crown prince’s bodyguard flew to Turkey on a private jet, along with other security agents who have been photographed previously guarding the crown price, and entered the Embassy before Khashoggi, along with a forensic doctor toting a bone saw. Khashoggi’s fiancé waited outside, and he never came out. Then, a cleaning crew was deployed. Walls were painted. Carpets were replaced. The crown prince initially denied that Khasoggi was killed, or that he knew anything about it. Now, the Kellyanne “rogue killer” story is being floated. It is not possible that the Saudi prince didn’t authorize this murder.

You speak of American interests and priorities. In America, we don’t kill people because we disagree with what they write. You claim that Khashoggi was in the Muslim Brotherhood, and that he was a virulent anti-Semite. Do you have any proof of either of these contentions, or is this more Hannity, Rush, Faux News spin? I’ve read some things written by Khashoggi, and there was nothing anti-Semitic there. Even if there were, we still don’t murder people for expressing their opinions.

In America, we don’t approve of some rich guy bragging about grabbing womens’ genitalia, we don’t praise White Supremacists who run over and kill a protester as “good people”, we don’t call African nations sh**hole countries, and we don’t constantly lie, make false claims about wealth and accomplishments that aren’t true, cheat on our spouses with porn stars or put innocent children in cages, now do we? We don’t overlook premeditated murder of a journalist because we don’t agree with the content of his writings, either. If you want to protect American values and interests, start at home.

“You speak of American interests and priorities. In America, we don’t kill people because we disagree with what they write.”
*************************
And we didn’t in this case but why let that little fact get in the way. You’re mad because the POTUS didn’t move to DEFCON4 with the Saudis. Sorry, Jamal Kashoggi is not that big a deal as you can read about, infra.

####

“You claim that Khashoggi was in the Muslim Brotherhood, and that he was a virulent anti-Semite. Do you have any proof of either of these contentions, or is this more Hannity, Rush, Faux News spin?”
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Already provided on this blawg but here’s a starting point for me educating you. Let me know where to send the tuition bill.

“In America, we don’t approve of some rich guy bragging about grabbing womens’ genitalia ….”
**********************************
Er, we have billion dollar rappers rapping about just this topic all the time. Didn’t see you on the ramparts about that. You only hate it when a white guy does it, I suppose, Look out Vanilla Ice!!

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“we don’t praise White Supremacists who run over and kill a protester as “good people”
************************

Nobody did. All that was said is that there were some good people on both sides out in the street in Charlottesville — a demonstrable truth. Not everybody, just some.

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“we don’t call African nations sh**hole countries,”
*********************
Nope, we just all know it to be true of some of them — literally true.

####

“and we don’t constantly lie, make false claims about wealth and accomplishments that aren’t true, cheat on our spouses with porn stars”
*******************
Scant proof of that unless you buy into the words of hookers and their sleazy lawyers

####

“or put innocent children in cages, now do we? ”

********************

That was Obama from whose era the pictures came.

####

Try that mantra I gave you. Maybe you’ll like the country again instead of all its rivals.

In Nutchacha’s alternate reality, the correct response to everything must be the polar opposite of whatever President Trump is doing and/or the Republicans. She hasn’t the self-awareness to realize the odds she’s 100% correct on everything, meaning President Trump and the Republicans are 100% wrong on everything, are absolutely zero.

The world is a complicated place and oftentimes there is no good option, just varying degrees of bad.

That’s Rush’s, Hannity’s, Tucker’s, Laura’s, and fake “Judge Jeanine’s” line in response to any criticism of Trump, no matter how valid.

How about the deficit? How about the FACT that the economy has not improved sufficiently to cover the massive and historic increase in the deficit, as promised by McConnell, Ryan and Fatso? How about seeking to cut Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security to cover the massive corporate and uber-wealthy tax cuts? Instead of personal attacks, why not respond with facts or evidence, or haven’t Kellyanne, Hannity, Faux News, et al, come up with some response to the REAL economic news?

Not that it would matter in your current state of psychosis; here is Politifact’s rating on the Left’s claim regarding:

Wyden said, “Republicans in Congress are plotting to take away Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security.”

Some key Republicans, including Ryan, have long argued in favor of overhauling entitlement programs such as these by reducing the amount of money spent on them. However, no Republican proposal has been made to “take away” any of the three programs cited in the tweet. In addition, Wyden glosses over just how far away from passage even a more modest overhaul would be.

Anonymouse, with an “e” at the end, is articulate and rational.
AnonymousE hasn’t commented much in recent months.
The “original Anonymous” ( no “e” at the end) seemed unable to write more than one or two sentences at a time.
The “Nutchacha Anonymous”, the one posting the fat-shaming and orange shaming diatribes, has been stuck in the “denial” and “anger” stages for nearly two years now.
Commentators Anonymous, known also as Covert Commentators, is an expanding group of mutually supportive, carping malcontents.
This may help to clear up any confusion caused by the multiple “anonymouses”.

The Fusion GPS investigation STARTED with a Republican opponent of the rodeo clown.

You’re a mendacious hag. The Washington Free Beacon commissioned some work from Simpson, who later repurposed the work product to produce oppo research for the Clinton campaign. While we’re at it, the Free Beacon is edited by Wm. Kristol’s son-in-law, so it wasn’t being done to benefit the Trump campaign, but Evan McMullin.

Let me see, let me see, who is more likely to be living in an alternate reality, Professor Turley or Nutchacha (aka: Anonymous)? All evidence points to the latter who seems stuck somewhere in the first 4 stages of the grief cycle.

Top Federal officials, based in the Beltway, generally earn no more than $200,000 per year. That annual salary looks big to common people living in the so-called ‘heartland’. But $200,000 per year is strictly middle-class in Greater Washington DC; one of the nation’s most expensive housing markets.

Therefore, the spouses of Federal Officials require employment to ensure their families financial well-being. But the economy of Greater Washington is not diverse enough to keep family paychecks from conflicting at times. The largest employers of said area are the Federal government, Federal contractors, lobbyists and foundations.

Consequently numerous professional couples, in Greater Washington, are likely to have apparent conflicts. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is married to Elaine Chao, the Secretary of Transportation. Almost anyone who cares about urban interests could seize on that marriage as ‘conflict of interest’. The politics of Mitch McConnell, a senator from Kentucky, is certainly less-than-friendly to urban regions. One could also note that Chao is independently quite wealthy. She scarcely needs employment!

Furthermore, professional couples in Greater Washington are likely to be political. And since there are only two major political parties, spouses are likely to vote one way or the either. Does that mean professional couples must change jobs every time the White House changes parties? Or every four years as elections approach? Such requirements would be totally unpractical for professional couples.

Professor Turley and Donald Trump are utterly cynical to claim that Bruce Ohr is somehow conflicted for knowing Christopher Steele and having a wife employed by Fushion GPS. As an expert on Russian organized crime, Ohr has known to Christopher Steele since 2006. What’s more, Fushion GPS is a research firm whose work is available to anyone who hires them. The Steele Report was originally commissioned by The Washington Examiner, a conservative-leaning paper. Was that a conflict of interest??

Turley ignores a vital fact: ‘Donald Trump was controversial from the very moment he announced his presidential campaign’. Trump had never held public office before. He was a long-established playboy with a history of what many would call unprincipled business practices. Trump had also led the so-called ‘birther movement’ which many would say was racist in nature.

AND WHAT ABOUT TRUMP’S MANY CONFLICTS?????

This current controversy regarding that murder at Saudi Arabia’s consulate, on Turkish soil, raises many questions regarding conflicts Trump and Kushner might have with regards to Saudi investors. Kushner alone has numerous conflicts that have been widely reported. How interested has Professor Turley been in reporting on those conflicts?

What a dumb article: “His refusal to follow norms set by his predecessors” There are no norms set by his predecessors because none of them had his wealth or type of wealth. By being President Trump has probably lost a lot of money while he improved the bottom line on most people’s income.

Allan: read the article, please, before you dispute what it says. The “bottom line” for “most people” is not better. Wages are flat, and the wealthy used the tax cuts to purchase stock options. The tax law actually incentivized offshore investment. Also, Fatso is nowhere near as wealthy as his devoted fans would like to believe, but if he continues to insist that he is, how about showing us his tax returns?

Also, Fatso is nowhere near as wealthy as his devoted fans would like to believe, but if he continues to insist that he is, how about showing us his tax returns?

Get back to us when you learn that tax returns are not income statements and income statements are not balance sheets. When you’ve mastered that, you can move on to something more challenging, like understanding econometric literature on tax incidence.

Wages are not flat and have increased. Run the numbers yourself or depend on half a brain.

When one looks at the tax law and runs the numbers instead of relying on pundits to provide your desired answer here is something you will find:

“According to Sentier Research, an economic-research firm founded by former Census Bureau officials, median household income in July 2017 was $60,879. In 2017 a married couple with no children filing jointly with income of $60,879 would have taken a standard deduction of $12,700 plus personal exemptions of $8,100, resulting in taxable income of $40,079. Their tax rate would have been 15%, for a federal income-tax liability of $5,079. After paying payroll taxes of $4,657, this couple would have taken home $51,143.

This year, assuming the BLS’s 3% increase in weekly earnings, the couple’s income would rise to $62,705. Following the tax cuts, their standard deduction would increase to $24,000, for taxable income of $37,705. Their federal income-tax rate would be 12%, for an income-tax liability of $4,264. Their payroll taxes would rise with their income to $4,797.

All told, the couple would take home $53,644. That’s an increase in take-home pay of $2,501, or 4.9%—nearly 70% higher than the 2.9% rate of inflation, assuming the inflation rate holds at around 2.9% for the rest of the year. With the expanded child tax credit, if this couple had one child, their take-home pay would increase 5.5%, or 90% higher than the inflation rate. Since the new withholding tables went into effect on Feb. 15, employees have seen the difference in bigger paychecks. Little wonder the Conference Board recently reported that consumer confidence surged in August to its highest level since October 2000, while the Commerce Department reported that consumer spending increased 0.4% in July, the sixth straight month of healthy gains.”

After awhile your statements based on how you feel and envy become tiresome. They are a giant waste of time because fact doesn’t enter your head or the other anonymous’s head. You see what you want to see and even when you are proven wrong you will repeat the same garbage over and over again. This President has done wonders for the economy and the former one failed.

Paul, it is becoming obvious that some of those named Anonymous don’t know very much about tax forms. The question is whether they ever earned money and if they did how they ever filed the tax form without ever looking at it. Maybe ignorance is bliss.

Trump’s not responsible for Arab thugs sawing up other Arab thugs in a consulate on Turkish soil. That would be, Arabs responsible for their heinous acts, and Turks who have the first place to criticize them for it

Step 1. in their Information Processing Flowchart is a decision point:
1. Do you support the President of the United States*?
A. Yes: Leads to an objective review of the information and further critical-thinking steps to form a reasonable and rational opinion.
B. No: Leads to no further review and a subjective and uninformed
conclusion that it’s the President’s fault.

“That annual salary looks big to common people living in the so-called ‘heartland’”

The above is what Peter Shill thinks about the average American,,,,they are all common people. The truth is that if those common people lived in Washington DC they could find housing and a lifestyle more than satisfied with a $200,000 a year income. The snobbish one’s I know in NYC think in a similar fashion because how can they miss the opening to a play and of course one has to take a cab back and forth with cabs to expensive restaurants unless they want to be considered common.

And a lot of people on the fringe coasts of America have big incomes and BIIIIIG debts.

I have a couple thin dimes to rub together stuffed in my sock drawer, so I don’t let my commoner sized salary bother me. I know some big shots who went to live in NYC and don’t have D ! C K in spite of their haughty attitudes and superior credit reports

“I know some big shots who went to live in NYC and don’t have D ! C K”

It’s known as envy, trying to live like the one down the block or up a couple of floors. That is the problem with a lot of those with leftist views. They want their “betters” to share what they have with them instead of trying to live a normal life.

yes absolutely and it’s also over-sensitivity to class distinctions which comes from living too close to the bone, as you observed, they’re always worried about running out of money and getting fired from their posts as adminstrative lackeys in academia and civil service and the worthless mass media

Furthermore, professional couples in Greater Washington are likely to be political.

No, they’re not, Peter Shill. About 3/4 of the people living and working in the Washington commuter belt work for (or are retired from) private enterprise or for public sector positions of a sort you find in abundance anywhere: local government, school districts, higher education &c. About 20% are federal civil servants or military. ‘Political Washington’ – i.e. elected officials, discretionary appointees, salaried congressional staff, judges and their clerks, political reporters and their editors; the proprietors and salaried and staff of the political parties, political consultances, advocacy groups, lobbying firms, and public relations firms; the policy shops and their denizens; the lawyers in firms with a ‘government relations practice’; the foreign diplomats and spooks; and the dependents of all these sectors make up a low-single-digit share of the population of the metropolitan settlement.

Squeaky – The D.C. court system has been reorganized several times, since the land on which D.C. sits was appropriated from Maryland and Virginia. The latest reorganization was in 1970, in which a Superior Court for the District of Columbia was established. It is much like a state court, except for the governing law. Rule 11-946 provides that , “The Superior Court shall conduct its business according to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure….” I know there is also a provision providing that wherever federal law doesn’t address an issue, that the DC courts willl apply Maryland law. That is a carryover from back in the Civil War era, when DC had two courts, one applying MD law and the other VA law. But due to concerns about VA’s loyalty to the federal government, the DC court system was reorganized to get rid of VA influence and keep Maryland’s. (More than you asked, but an interesting bit of history.)

“The one catch to the marital privilege in Maryland is that it may only be invoked one time. If a spouse has previously used the marital privilege in Maryland, then that spouse cannot use it a second time. So that is something that needs to be taken into consideration and you should discuss the matter at length with an experienced defense attorney.

Squeaky, That’s an exception for domestic violence cases only. There are two exceptions to MD’s spousal privilege law in criminal cases 1): A spouse cannot refuse to testify against a husband/wife who is accused of abusing a child under the age of 18; and 2): A spouse can only refuse to testify against a husband/ wife accused of domestic battery one time. So for those women who keep returning to the A-hole who beats them and their children, they’ll need to either move out of MD. or face jail time for refusing to testify against him. In all other situations, the spousal privilege is freely available.

Allan, I see Prof Turley’s statement as aspirational, not as a reflection of the law as it currently stands. If Nellie Ohr can legally assert the marital privilege and refuse to answer, then so be it. Perhaps the law needs to be changed; there are good reasons pro and con, but for now, it looks as though she is following the advice of counsel and they’re not going to be able to force her testimony.